Unpermitted additions negate fire insurance?

Should you add square footage with your own hands, hire subcontractors to do it or pay a licensed contractor to oversee the project?

The upside to doing it yourself, as evidenced by this Westchester addition designed and built by an aerospace engineer and his brother, is that you get a bunch of new space for a lot less money.

The downsides come when you don’t do it according to code and don’t get permits. This engineer did all that correctly, as engineers are apt to do, but other types of homeowners may forgo those details.

If you do an addition without a permit or not to code, or both, here are some dangers, according to a story today at CNN.com:

– The structure could be unsafe for your family and future families.– Unpermitted space could stop or delay a sale.– You might have to tear down or expensively retrofit out-of-code upgrades later on.

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